Trapped with the Mob Boss: A Mafia Romance (Petrov Bratva) by Nicole Fox (best book recommendations txt) 📗

I’m mentally tracing back over her steps for the last several weeks, wondering where she would go first. Not her father’s house since she just discovered his secrets. Not her house since she might be a target for not just one, but two criminal organizations. Maybe her best friend’s house?

Then, I hear a small cough and look up to see Bella standing in the doorway. She found the jeans and T-shirt I bought for her and stashed in the drawers, and her long hair is pulled back in a messy bun on top of her head. Her eyes are clear, but they’re puffy from crying.

I hold out the to-go bag I’m carrying. “Chinese food. If you want it.”

She looks at the bag and bites her lower lip. “That’s my favorite takeout place.”

I know. She went there twice a week while I was keeping tabs on her. It’s a family-owned operation on the other side of town. The hotel was way beyond their delivery range, so I had to pay one of the men on the bottom rung of our operation to pick it up for me. And I might have threatened his nuts if he didn’t have it at the hotel within twenty minutes.

“Lo mein and egg rolls.” I drop the bag on the coffee table in front of the sofa and stand back.

She hesitates and then moves towards the table, stopping when she sees the cardboard box next to the bag. “What is that?”

“Death by chocolate.”

Bella looks over her shoulder at me. “You bought me a cake?”

“And a brownie,” I say, pointing to the plastic-wrapped fudgy square behind the box. It feels like too much. Like an obvious buy off that she’ll reject and continue hating me. But it was all I could think to do. I’d buy her favorite things, let her know I’m not a total monster, not completely, anyway.

I’m not even sure why I care what she thinks. Why it matters. But it does. Because if Bella thinks I’m irredeemable, then it must be true. If she doesn’t think I’m worth her time, then I’ll know I’m not. But I want to be.

She sits down and digs into the Chinese food, slowly at first, but picking up speed as her hunger takes the reins. I move towards her slowly, like I’m approaching a timid animal, and when I finally sit on the sofa next to her, she stiffens but keeps eating.

“Do you want any?” she asks.

“No, I’m fine.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, my stomach growls. She looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “I don’t like Chinese food.”

All the progress I’ve made so far might be undone by that phrase. She looks at me like I just beat a puppy. “You what?”

“It’s not for me,” I shrug. “My dad used to take us to a Chinese buffet every Thursday because it was ‘all you can eat,’ and I lost the taste for it. You can only have reheated orange chicken so many times before it ruins it for you forever.”

“But have you had this Chinese food?” she asks, pointing to the open cardboard carton on the table.

“Do you mean this specific Chinese food or—”

“The restaurant,” she says, rolling her eyes. Yesterday I was annoyed with how often she rolled her eyes at me. Now, I realize how much I would miss it if she ever stopped.

I shake my head, and suddenly there are chopsticks in my hand and Bella is thrusting a carton of lo mein into my hands.

“But I don’t—”

“Eat.” She widens her eyes in a threatening manner, and I realize it’s a command. Before my freak-out an hour ago, I would have shoved the carton back at her and made some remark about not taking orders from my hostage, but now I have to eat crow. Which means I have to eat Chinese food.

I swirl the noodles clumsily around the chopsticks and take a reluctant bite as she watches. She smiles as I chew, her eyebrows rising higher and higher until they nearly disappear into her hairline. “So ...”

“It’s Chinese food,” I shrug, swallowing and handing her the carton. “And it tastes exactly how I remember.”

She sags. “I thought that was going to be more of a revelation for you. You really don’t like it?”

“It’s not the Chinese food, it’s me,” I say. “I hated going with my family to get Chinese every week, and I’m pretty sure we only used that restaurant because my father did business with them. I was too young to pay much attention at the time.”

“One time, my mom made peanut butter cookies while I had the flu, and now I can’t eat baked goods with peanut butter in them without feeling nauseous,” Bella offers. “Is that how you feel about Chinese food?”

“I guess so.” It feels weird to be talking about Chinese food when our last conversation was so intense. So cruel. But I’m just glad she’s talking to me and looking at me. I have no intention of doing anything to screw it up. “My dad liked to keep a strict schedule when we were kids. We woke up at the same time every day whether it was a weekday or the weekend. Every Saturday we cleaned our rooms and the house. Every Sunday we went to church and then to a sandwich shop next door. And Thursdays were for Chinese. Not liking the food was my small way of rebelling, I think. It was the only rebellion that wouldn’t earn my father’s wrath.”

“You went to church?” Bella asks, nose wrinkled.

“You seem surprised.”

“Well,” she says, head bobbing back and forth. “Kind of. Your father is a criminal.”

“Did your family go to church?” I ask.

“Every Sunday,” she nods, smiling at the memory. Then her smile falters and she frowns. “I guess my father is a criminal too. Both of our dads were liars.”

“Well, actually, only your dad was a liar,” I say softly. “But my dad was a lot